Automatic continuous mail handling system

ABSTRACT

A continuous mail sorting and postage imprinting system which automatically weighs and meters each piece of mail. The system is designed to rapidly handle a large quantity of mixed mail. Mixed mail is continuously and synchronously fed in seriatim along a continuous feed path. Unsealed envelopes have their flaps wetted and sealed. All the envelopes are stopped at a weighing station where they are weighed, and the postage corresponding to their particular weight is computed. The determined postage value is used to continuously reset a postage meter which imprints the required postage upon each envelope as it arrives at a metering station. The metering and weighing functions of the system are synchronized such that the postage meter will imprint the proper postage upon each piece of mail, despite the fact that several envelopes may be simultaneously in transit along the feed path. Overweight pieces of mail are rejected from the feed path prior to their reaching the postage meter station. Metered and overweight pieces of mail are separately stacked.

Storace et al.

[ 1 AUTOMATIC CONTINUOUS MAIL HANDLING SYSTEM [75] Inventors: Anthony Storace, Tarrytown, N.Y.;

Fredric E. Zucker, Stamford, Conn.

[73] Assignee: Pitney-Bowes, lnc., Stamford, Conn.

[22] Filed: June 5, 1974 [21] Appl. No.: 476,618

[52] U.S. CI. 177/1; 177/3; 198/39 [51] Int. Cl.....- G0lg 23/38; B65g 69/00 [58] Field of Search 177/1, 3, 12, 25. 52, 13;

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 3,085,640 4/1963 Allen 177/3 3,196,964 7/1965 Allen 177/3 3,290,491 12/1966 Wahlberg 209/121 X 3,453,167 7/1969 Arvidson et al. 198/39 X 3,811,522 5/1974 Wolf et al. 177/13 Primary E.raminerGeorge H. Miller, Jr. Attorney, Agent, or Firm-William D. Soltow, Jr.; Albert W. Scribner; Robert S. Salzman Apr. 15, 1975 [57] ABSTRACT A continuous mail sorting and postage imprinting system which automatically weighs and meters each piece of mail. The system is designed to rapidly handle a large quantity of mixed mail. Mixed mail is continuously and synchronously fed in seriatim along a continuous feed path. Unsealed envelopes have their flaps wetted and sealed. All the envelopes are stopped at a weighing station where they are weighed, and the postage corresponding to their particular weight is computed. The determined postage value is used to continuously reset a postage meter which imprints the required postage upon each envelope as it arrives at a metering station. The metering and weighing functions of the system are synchronized such that the postage meter will imprint the proper postage upon each piece of mail, despite the fact that several envelopes may be simultaneously in transit along the feed path. Overweight pieces of mail are rejected from the feed path prior to their reaching the postage meter station. Metered and overweight pieces of mail are separately stacked.

19 Claims, 29 Drawing Figures ceeoen. DRIVE nae-sen. 5am Pas-sate POST-SCALE l3 TRANSFER ISTNIION TRANSFER Mspgn STATION 17 srmou 18 srmou 2| TRANSFER WEIGHIMG GATE 23 POSTAGE METER STATION 20 22 STATION 23 I \ETER Z4 1 8 %88 age 0 1 T reso mu SEDARAZOR SCALE 1% STATION 25 REJECT STACKER '26 (OVER-WEIGHT MAIL) METERED MAIL STAG KE R 2'7 PATENTEDAPRI 51975 SHEET OBUF 19 PATENTEDAPR 1 5191s SHEEY on HF 19 .Eogam w2 du ob PATENTEDAPRI 5 I975 SHEET UBUF 19 coAwmv PATENTEUAPRI 5191s saw 070F 19 3871531 PATENTEDA RI W5 3.877. 531 SHEET 080F 19 PATENTEB 51975 SHEET Us 0F 19 3. 8.7 I. 531

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PMENTEDAPR 1 5 I975 SHEET lUOF 19 ACTUATOR SETTINGS STEPPER MOTORS sousuoms DOLLARS (O-l) TENS (0-9) CENTS (0-9) PATENTEU APR 1 51975 SHEET 17 0F 19 PATENTEDAPR 1 5197s SHEET 180!-' 19 

1. A method of continuously processing a large volume Of mixed mail, whereby individual pieces of mail are continuously fed with a substantially vertical orientation in seriatim along a feed path comprising a weighing station and a postage meter station, each piece of mail being weighed, and then imprinted with postage corresponding to the weight of said pieces of mail, the method comprising the steps of: a. continuously feeding in seriatim with a substantially vertical orientation, a quantity of mail along a continuous feed path; b. continuously delivering in seriatim each piece of mail to a weighing station disposed along said feed path, for weighing said mail; c. weighing each piece of mail delivered to said weighing station; d. determining the amount of postage needed for each weighed piece of mail; e. continuously delivering in seriatim each piece of weighed mail to a postage meter station disposed along said feed path; f. controlling the amount of postage to be imprinted upon each piece of mail so that it corresponds with the amount of determined postage; and g. imprinting each piece of mail delivered to said postage meter station with the controlled amount of postage.
 2. The method of processing mixed mail of claim 1, comprising the additional steps of: h. supporting a stack of mixed mail; and i. feeding pieces of mail into said feed path from said stack.
 3. The method of processing mixed mail of claim 1, comprising the additional step of: h. sealing unsealed pieces of mail being fed along said feed path.
 4. A continuous automatic weighing and metering mail handling system for processing a large volume of mixed mail, said mail handling system automatically weighing and imprinting postage upon individual pieces of mail being continuously fed in seriatim with a substantially vertical orientation along a continuous feed path comprising a weighing station and a postage meter station, said weighing station automatically weighing each piece of mail and determining the amount of the postage to be imprinted thereon, the amount of postage to be imprinted by said postage meter station on each piece of mail being controlled to correspond to said determined amount, said mail handling system comprising: means defining a continuous mail handling feed path wherein pieces of mail are transported with a substantially vertical orientation; a weighing station comprising postage determining means, said weighing station disposed along said continuous feed path for measuring the weight of each piece of mail delivered to said weighing station and determining the amount of postage to be imprinted on each piece of mail which has been weighed; a first automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim a plurality of individual pieces of mail along said continuous feed path to said weighing station; a postage meter station disposed along said continuous feed path for receiving said weighed mail from said weighing station, and imprinting postage upon the mail in accordance with the amount of postage determined by said weighing station; a second automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim along said feed path the weighed pieces of mail from said weighing station to said postage meter station; and control means operatively interconnected between said weighing station and said postage meter station, said control means being responsive to the postage amount determined by said weighing station for causing the imprinted postage amount of said postage meter station to correspond with said determined amount for each piece of mail.
 5. The mail handling system of claim 1, further comprising supporting means disposed adjacent said feed path supporting a quantity of mixed mail, and feeding means carried by said supporting means for feeding said quantity of mail towards said feed path.
 6. The handling system of claim 1, further comprising sealing means disposed along said feed path for sealing unsealed pieces of mail being fed alOng said feed path.
 7. The mail handling system of claim 1, wherein said first automatic delivering means comprises decelerating means for stopping mail which is moving along said feed path, and said weighing station comprises a scale for weighing pieces of mail, said decelerating means stopping each piece of moving mail so that it deposits upon said scale for weighing.
 8. The mail handling system of claim 1, wherein the postage meter station comprises an imprinting mechanism, and the second automatic delivering means comprises a compensatingly movable deck which is adjustable in response to different thicknesses of mail being delivered to the imprinting mechanism of said postage meter station, whereby a substantially uniform imprint impression is provided for each piece of mail irregardless of its thickness.
 9. A continuous automatic weighing and metering mail handling system for processing a large volume of mixed mail, said mail handling system automatically weighing and imprinting postage upon individual pieces of mail being continuously fed in seriatim along a continuous feed path comprising a weighing station and a postage meter station, said weighing station automatically weighing each piece of mail, the amount of the postage to be imprinted thereon then being determined, and the amount of postage to be imprinted by said postage meter station on each piece of mail subsequently being controlled to correspond to said determined amount, said mail handling system comprising: means defining a continuous mail handling feed path; a weighing station disposed along said continuous feed path for measuring the weight of each piece of mail delivered to said weighing station; a first automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim a plurality of individual pieces of mail along said continuous feed path to said weighing station; a postage meter station disposed along said continuous feed path for receiving each piece of weighed mail from said weighing station, and imprinting postage upon the mail in accordance with the amount of postage determined for the weight of each piece of mail; a second automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim along said feed path the weighed pieces of mail from said weighing station to said postage meter station; computational means operatively interconnected between the weighing station and the postage meter station for determining the required postage for each piece of mail being delivered to said postage meter station for imprinting of postage; and control means operatively interconnected between said computational means and said postage meter station, said control means being responsive to the postage amount determined by said computational means for causing the imprinted postage amount to correspond with said determined amount.
 10. The mail handling system of claim 9, wherein said computational means comprises selection means to vary the unit price per unit increment of weight, and multiplication means to perform a multiplication between the weight of each piece of mail and the selected unit price.
 11. The mail handling system of claim 10, wherein said computational means further comprises a by-pass control means for bypassing said multiplication means for causing each piece of mail to be imprinted with a constant unit price for the purposes of bulk mailing.
 12. The mail handling system of claim 9, wherein said postage meter station comprises a postage meter having a plurality of imprint wheels for imprinting units, tens, and dollar digits of a value of postage.
 13. The mail handling system of claim 12, wherein said control means comprises a plurality of stepper motors for incrementing said imprint wheels in a bi-directional manner.
 14. The mail handling system of claim 13, wherein the computational means comprises stepper motor pulse generating means which is responsive to said determined postage amount and provides pulse outputs to said stepper motors depeNdent upon said determined amount of postage and a previous position of said stepper motors.
 15. A continuous automatic weighing and metering mail handling system for processing a large volume of mixed mail, said mail handling system automatically weighing and imprinting postage upon individual pieces of mail being continuously fed in seriatim along a continuous feed path comprising a weighing station and a postage meter station, said weighing station automatically weighing each piece of mail, determining means are operatively connected to the weighing station for determining the amount of the postage to be imprinted on each piece of mail, and the amount of postage to be imprinted by said postage meter station on each piece of mail being controlled to correspond to said determined amount, said mail handling system comprising: means defining a continuous mail handling feed path; a weighing station disposed along said continuous feed path for measuring the weight of each piece of mail delivered to said weighing station; computational determining means operatively connected to said weighing station for electronically determining the amount of postage to be imprinted on each piece of mail which has been weighed by said weighing stataion; a first automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim a plurality of individual pieces of mail along said continuous feed path to said weighing station; a postage meter station disposed along said continuous feed path for receiving said weighed mail from said weighing station, and imprinting postage upon the mail in accordance with the amount of postage determined by said determining means; a second automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim along said feed path the weighed pieces of mail from said weighing station to said postage meter station; control means operatively interconnected between said determining means and said postage meter station, said control means being responsive to the postage amount determined by said determining means for causing the imprinted postage amount of said postage meter station to correspond with said determined amount; and information synchronization means operatively interconnected between said weighing station and the computational determining means, for insuring that each piece of weighed mail will be imprinted with the determined amount of postage for that individual piece of mail when said weighed piece of mail is delivered to said postage meter station.
 16. The mail handling system of claim 15, wherein said synchronization means comprises at least one buffer for storing information of a weighed piece of mail, and buffer control means for transferring the stored information from the buffer to said computational determining means for determining the amount of postage required for the weighed piece of mail.
 17. The mail handling system of claim 15, wherein said synchronization comprises two buffers, a first buffer for storing weighing information of a first piece of mail substantially disposed at said weighing station, and a second buffer operatively connected to said first buffer for storing weighing information of a second but previously weighed piece of mail which is substantially in transit to said postage meter station from said weighing station.
 18. The mail handling system of claim 17, wherein said synchronization means further comprises a first control means operatively connected to said buffers for controlling the transfer of weighing information from the first buffer to said second buffer, and second control means operatively connected to said second buffer for transferring weighing information from said second buffer to said determining means.
 19. A continuous automatic weighing and metering mail handling system for processing a large volume of mixed mail, said mail handling system automatically weighing and imprinting postage upon individual pieces of mail being continuously fed in seriatim aLong a continuous feed path comprising a weighing station and a postage meter station, said weighing station automatically weighing each piece of mail, determining means are operatively connected to the weighing station for determining the amount of the postage to be imprinted on each piece of mail, and the amount of postage to be imprinted by said postage meter station on each piece of mail being controlled to correspond to said determined amount, said mail handling system comprising: means defining a continuous mail handling feed path; a weighing station disposed along said continuous feed path for measuring the weight of each piece of mail delivered to said weighing station; determining means operatively connected to said weighing station for determining the amount of postage to be imprinted on each piece of mail which has been weighed by said weighing station; a first automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim a plurality of individual pieces of mail along said continuous feed path to said weighing station; a postage meter station disposed along said continuous feed path for receiving said weighed mail from said weighing station, and imprinting postage upon the mail in accordance with the amount of postage determined by said weighing station; a second automatic delivering means for continuously delivering in seriatim along said feed path the weighed pieces of mail from said weighing station to said postage meter station; control means operatively interconnected between said determining means and said postage meter station, said control means being responsive to the postage amount determined by said determining means for causing the imprinted postage amount of said postage meter station to correspond with said determined amount; and traffic control means operatively connected along said feed path means for synchronizing the flow of mail along said feed path such that at any one instant a multiplicity of pieces of mail will be in transit at different stations along said feed path. 